Could Bored To Death Return As A Movie Or Comic Book?

Bored to Death was one of three casualties in HBO's brutal culling of its half-hour shows earlier this week. The cable network canceled the Jason Schwartzman/Zack Galifianakis/Ted Danson comedy along with Hung and How to Make It in America. It was sad news for fans, but show creator Jonathan Ames invited them out to join him in toasting the show's passing at the Brooklyn Inn. The Wall Street Journal reports that "hundreds" of fans turned out for the event, not to mention Daily Show resident expert John Hodgman and cartoonist Dean Haspiel. He designed the show's cartoonish opening credits and was the basis for Galifianakis' character. But while the event was ostensibly to memorialize the end of the show, it also contained hints that Bored to Death might continue in some form.

Haspiel speculated that the show might find a home in a different format, or perhaps on another channel. He told a WSJ reporter that:

This is a wake for Bored to Death but itís also an awakening. Itís a multi-media world and I can see the show living on as a comic book or a movie -- or, and I donít quite know how this works, but maybe even transitioning to another TV station.

That would be easy enough to write off as mere wishful thinking, but Haspiel obviously isn't the only one who's given though to finding a way to continue the series. In an interview with New York Magazine, Ames said, "I have ideas for a fourth season that could translate nicely into a fun caper/detective movie."

It's the sort of thing you hear all the time in the aftermath of a show with a cult following getting the axe, but we can't entirely rule out the possibilities, either. Once, sure, this would have all been a lot of hot air and denial, but we live in a world where Family Guy, Arrested Development, and Futurama have all been (or are in the process of being) resurrected, and where shows like Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Firefly, and Farscape are all enjoying healthy post-TV lives in official, canonical, creator-approved comics. Maybe, just maybe, Bored to Death will join the club.